No Complaints: The Bracelet Week One
Posted: Thursday, March 29, 2007 9:00 AM by Jaclyn Levin
Today Producer Stephanie Becker is blogging about her 21 day quest to quit complaining. She started last week. Her assignment kicked off after a recent Today Show Story about a Missouri Pastor’s mission to get his parishioners to quit complaining. He’s given out purple rubber bracelets as a reminder. Break the vow and switch the wrist the bracelet is on.)
Week One and Counting (the infractions)
The first week of this experiment in self-restraint ended as it began -- with some rapid wristband rotation. My defense? I was blasted out of a dead sleep after a long night of editing, so I had no control. It was just after 6AM when my bedside phone exploded. It was Dad.
“Mom and I just saw you on the Today Show and we’re so proud!” He was absolutely off the charts happy.
“Do you have ANY idea what time it is here?” I barked back. “You couldn’t wait to call later?”
“Better switch that bracelet Steph-a-noodle!” Dad invoked my hated childhood nickname. (Insert photo of Stephanie’s wake up call reenactment)
It was just after 9AM in New York where my folks live, but not out here in Los Angeles where I live and presumably sleep. So I was completely blindsided by his pre-dawn cheerfulness.
I should have been thrilled. My blog was getting an unexpected shout-out on the show. Unbeknownst to me, just moments earlier Matt and Al were yucking it up about my well-known short fuse and begging viewers to give me advice to curtail my kvetching. Maybe you heard the studio crew in the background roaring with laughter at my expense. Hey! Miracles do happen. Sanjaya made it through another round of American Idol.
I am not alone in this quest to be complaint free. According to Pastor Will Bowen, the guy who started it all, he’s had more than a million requests for bracelets. So, I’m now banded together with one out of every 300 Americans. By the way, is it a co-incidence that 1 out of every 300 Americans is also a millionaire? And why can’t I be in THAT group? I wonder if any millionaires requested bracelets.
I’m not even alone in the Burbank bureau. Norma, who works the morning desk, also has one. She is way nicer than I am. I suspect she’ll have a nice tan line on her arm by the end of all this.
All week we’ve been swapping strategies. For instance, as with any bad habit, it’s a good idea to avoid temptation. So I’ve instructed my tennis teacher that there will be no more backhands until this is over. And no matter what appliance is on the fritz, I will not fix it. There’s no way I could survive the call for, the wait for or the bill for a repair without some major backsliding.
The worst temptation is not being able to join in on the fun. Like on Friday when my pal Roselyn – a Grande Dame of Grumblers - went on a 15-minute rant about a department store return. I was dying. It’s excruciating not to participate. I pretended to be Wonder Woman deflecting bullets with my purple rubber bangle. While she vented, I resisted by noshing on her pulled pork with cornbread. Of course in a day or two I’ll probably have fight off the urge to complain about weight gain.
All this mellowness is freaking people out. Even my boss is a little concerned. She wrote to the blog that she misses the “old me.” But, probably not so much.
Now’s a good time to thank everyone who e-mailed me advice and encouragement on the blog. I have read it all, several times to remind me to eat chocolate and think positive and chill. Sadly, friends with my personal email are much less supportive than the folks who don’t know me. Here’s to the kindness of strangers.
I’m also struggling with this conundrum. If Jimmy Carter says adultery counts even if you just lust in your heart, do I have to switch wrists if I just THINK a complaint? Like when that blonde pulled her big fat black SUV into my bicycle lane. The cartoon bubble over my head read: “Did your hair dye seep into your cortex robbing you of cognitive reason and depth perception?” Actually, I thought something a little shorter and simpler. But, I didn’t say it. Although, I did tell my bike-riding buddy what I was thinking and that I didn’t say it. He asked if I was a New Yorker because Californians would think it, not say it and not agonize over not saying it. Then he told me to move my bracelet to the other arm.
I’m also wondering if you can accrue credits to balance out to the lapses? For instance, 
Thursday turned out to be a ‘random acts of kindness’ day. I saw a white Suburban making a weird noise from the right rear tire. I caught up to it on my bike. A friend was driving. Turns out she’d picked up a fork in the road and the prongs were bent into the rubber. Her tire was slowly deflating. Phew! Saved her from the agony of finding a flat. Then I found a cell phone on the side of the road and tracked down its owner. I did get a little cranky when she wanted me to bring it to her. I was seven miles away by bike. Apparently I’d found it right outside her workplace, if only I’d gone in. But, I was feeling very Nancy Drew at the time. I was going to complain about her attitude. Then she told me she didn’t have a car and she works two jobs. Way to go to make me feel bad. I changed wrists just because….
So how am I doing after one week? While I haven’t gone cold turkey I am definitely making progress. Even my Dad thinks I’m on my way to becoming a nicer person. But, let’s wait and see what time he calls me this weekend.
